THE CATHEDRAL CHURCH OF
NORWICH

A DESCRIPTION OF ITS FABRIC
AND A BRIEF HISTORY OF THE
EPISCOPAL SEE

BY

C.H.B. QUENNELL

WITH FORTY

ILLUSTRATIONS

LONDON GEORGE BELL & SONS 1898

W.H. WHITE AND CO. LIMITED
RIVERSIDE PRESS, EDINBURGH

GENERAL PREFACE

This series of monographs has been planned to supply visitors to the great English Cathedrals with accurate and well illustrated guide-books at a popular price. The aim of each writer has been to produce a work compiled with sufficient knowledge and scholarship to be of value to the student of Archaeology and History, and yet not too technical in language for the use of an ordinary visitor or tourist.

To specify all the authorities which have been made use of in each case would be difficult and tedious in this place. But amongst the general sources of information which have been almost invariably found useful are:—(1) the great county histories, the value of which, especially in questions of genealogy and local records, is generally recognised; (2) the numerous papers by experts which appear from time to time in the Transactions of the Antiquarian and Archaeological Societies; (3) the important documents made accessible in the series issued by the Master of the Rolls; (4) the well-known works of Britton and Willis on the English Cathedrals; and (5) the very excellent series of Handbooks to the Cathedrals originated by the late Mr John Murray; to which the reader may in most cases be referred for fuller detail, especially in reference to the histories of the respective sees.

GLEESON WHITE,
EDWARD F. STRANGE,
Editors of the Series.


AUTHOR'S PREFACE

The task of writing a monograph, on such an essentially Norman Cathedral as Norwich, has been most pleasing to one who owns to an especial fondness for that sturdy architecture which was evolved in England during one of her stormiest epochs—from the end of the eleventh till the end of the twelfth century.

I would here acknowledge indebtedness and thanks due to the Very Rev. the Dean and Mrs Sheepshanks for the personal interest they evinced, and for his material help; to Mr J.B. Spencer, the sub-sacrist, for that help which his intimate association with the cathedral enabled him to offer; and to Mr S.K. Greenslade for the loan of the drawings reproduced under his name; as well as to the Photochrom Co. Ltd., Messrs S.B. Bolas & Co., and Mr F.G.M. Beaumont for the use of their photographs. The views of the cathedral as it appeared in the early part of the nineteenth century are reproduced from Britton's "Norwich," and from a volume by Charles Wild.

C.H.B.Q.


CONTENTS

[CHAPTER I.—History of the Fabric]3
[CHAPTER II.—The Cathedral—Exterior]23
[The Cathedral Precincts]23
[The Erpingham Gate]23
[St. Ethelbert's Gate and the Gate-House]25
[Chapel of St. John the Evangelist]27
[The West Front of the Cathedral]28
[Exterior of Nave]31
[The South Transept]32
[The Diocesan Registry Offices and Slype]35
[The Chapter-House]36
[The Tower and Spire]36
[The Eastern Arm of Cathedral or Presbytery]39
[The Chapels of St. Mary-the-Less and Saint Luke]39, 40
[The Jesus Chapel and Reliquary Chapel]40
[The North Transept]40
[The Bishop's Palace]43
[CHAPTER III.—The Interior]45
[The Nave]45
[The Choir Screen]49
[The Nave Vault]50
[The West Window and West Door]55
[The North and South Aisles of Nave]55, 56
[Monuments in Nave and Aisles of Nave]57, 58
[The Cloisters]58
[The Walks—East, South, and West]62, 63
[The Ante-choir and Choir]64
[The Pelican Lectern]68
[The Presbytery]68
[Reliquary Chapel]72
[Monuments in the Presbytery]74
[The North Transept]76
[The Tower and Triforium Walks]79
[The Processional Path]79
[The Jesus Chapel]83
[St. Luke's Chapel]88
[Treasury and Muniment Room]88
[The Bauchon Chapel]88
[The South Transept]88
[Monuments]91
[CHAPTER IV.—The Sees of the East Anglian Bishops]95
[CHAPTER V.—The City]111

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

[Norwich Cathedral from the South-East]Frontispiece
[Arms of Norwich]Title
[The Cathedral from the South-West]2
[The Cathedral in the Seventeenth Century]9
[West Front of the Cathedral in 1816]15
[The Cathedral from the South-West Angle of Cloisters]22
[The Erpingham Gate]24
[St. Ethelbert's Gate]25
[The Gate-House of the Bishop's Palace]25
[West Front of the Cathedral]28
[The Clerestory and Triforium of Choir (South Side)]32
[The Tower in 1816]37
[Exterior of the Chapel of St. Luke from the East]40
[A Norman Capital]46
[The Nave, looking East]47
[The Choir Screen and Organ from the Nave]50
[The North Aisle of Nave, looking West]56
[The East Walk of the Cloisters]58
[The Cloisters from the Garth]59
[The Prior's Door]63
[The Choir and Presbytery]65
[A Stall in the Choir]67
[The Choir and Presbytery in 1816]69
[The Choir Stalls at the beginning of the Nineteenth Century]70
[The Choir, looking West]72
[Detail of the Presbytery Clerestory and Vaulting]74
[The Choir Apse]77
[Detail of the Clerestory, North Transept]80
[The South Aisle of Presbytery, looking East]81
[Norman Work in the Lantern of Tower]83
[The Ante-Reliquary Bridge Chapel]84
[Doorway and Screen between South Transept and Aisle of Presbytery]88
[View across the Apse from the Chapel of St. Luke]89
[The Resurrection: from the Painted Retable formerly in the Jesus Chapel]93
[Norwich Castle]99
[The Guildhall]103
[Monument of Bishop Goldwell]107
[The Pelican Lectern in the Choir]110
[Pull's Ferry]112
[PLAN OF THE CATHEDRAL]113